Blossoms of Yesterday*
by Echo Lodge
Summary: Gilbert had just received his license to practice medicine. He would marry his fiancee, Christine Stuart, in the fall and start his practice. Everything was going as planned ¡¦ until an irresistible redhead entered his life and turned his world upside d
1. Default Chapter

Blossoms of Yesterday  
  
-1-  
  
Leaves the color of fire rustled gently in the autumn breeze. The mild fragrance of roses in late bloom tickled Gilbert's nose as he reclined on the patio sofa, a newspaper folded lazily on his lap. Was it the time of year or the article he had just read, but there was that ever-tightening of throat and acceleration of heart beat … it always happened when he found himself reminded of her. She had gone away in the fall. How he hated that time of year now. Gilbert sat up and flicked open the newspaper again, to read over that article … the play of words, the gentle tones, descriptive and witty, the rather eccentric style of expression… how those very words seemed to conjure up images of her …  
  
"Gilbert honey, dinner will be ready in half an hour. Okay?"  
  
"Sure, take your time."  
  
Gilbert sat back and closed his eyes. Half against his will, he thought back to the summer three years ago when he had first met her …  
  
**********  
  
"We've found someone who will rent out the cottage for the summer, dear."  
  
Gilbert merely grunted in answer as he hammered away. He was fixing up the gate, a task he had been meaning to do for quite some time now.  
  
Gilbert's mother perused the letter in hand, leaning against the gate her son had just hammered in place.  
  
"She's a writer dear, a 36-year-old free-lance writer it says here. She's single and would like to rent out the Blythe Homestead for the summer."  
  
"Ah! ANOTHER old maid!" Gilbert grinned as he stood up, wiping the sweat off his brow.  
  
"Her way of writing is rather queer dear, she wrote: 'I'm hoping there will be more scope for the imagination in that lovely sea-haven called Prince Edward Island.' Now isn't that a rather strange way of expressing things?"  
  
With squinted eye, Gilbert was busy taking measurements as he mumbled,  
  
"Very strange … but all writers are Mum. Just gotta learn to take them with a grain of salt now and then. There! It's done!"  
  
Gilbert's mother looked over her son's work.  
  
"Hmmm, not bad for a fully licensed doctor!" She looked proudly at her son.  
  
"Ah! But can he sew torn ligaments as well as he hammers?! THAT is the question!" Gilbert joked.  
  
"We'll see come October. It will be your day of reckoning, your own practice Gilbert. I hope no one becomes seriously ill your first few days, dear, it would be so disheartening if you hammered a torn ligament!"  
  
"Oh! A joke! Ha! Thanks for the vote of confidence, MOTHER! You ARE my real mother, by the way, aren't you?!"  
  
They walked back to the house, arm in arm.  
  
"Has Christine sent a telegram yet? Did she arrive safely in England?"  
  
"Yup, got it this morning. She's settled in happily at her aunt's house and hopes to have the summer of her life before she's tied down forever to a country doctor!"  
  
"Gilbert dear, sit here for a moment. I wanted to ask you … are you happy with Christine? I mean, are you truly in love with her?"  
  
Gilbert's surprised gaze met his mother's questioning eyes,  
  
"Mum! What kind of question is that? Hey, what's the matter? Don't tell me you're having second thoughts now that we're engaged!" Gilbert groaned playfully and rolled his eyes.  
  
"No, dear … it's just that …"  
  
Gilbert's mother looked out onto the horizon, unable to finish.  
  
Gilbert raked his hair and gave a small sigh.  
  
"Mum, I do love Christine. Christine and I … we go way back, you know. Things are just right with us, always been."  
  
Gilbert's mother took her son's hand and squeezed it warmly.  
  
"I know dear. It's just that, sometimes, I can't help thinking that your relationship with Christine is so … so … well, calculated and stale. I mean, well, I'll be honest with you dear. You're yet 26 years old. I wonder if you've ever felt that spark, that breath of tingling excitement … oh, I don't know if you understand but, well, a little bit of spontaneity in your life. It's just, honey, when I was with your father, God rest his soul, there was something in his manner, the way he walked and talked and just WAS that had "I'm in love" written all over him. Being in love and loving can be quite different, you know …"  
  
Gilbert put an arm around his mother and squeezed her chummily.  
  
"Mum, you gotta understand, Dad was a very special kind of man. He was a … well, a passionate kind of man, you know, very enthusiastic with a zest for life. I'm not that way like him. Perhaps I am a calculating kind of person, God knows maybe I might have made a better accountant than a doctor … but Mum, I can honestly say if I am passionate about anything, it's being a doctor. Saving lives, fighting death and disease! That's my passion. And Christine, well, she's the ideal partner in my life. I really can't quite see into that in love and loving mumbo-jumbo but Mum, everything will work out just fine, you'll see!"  
  
With another reassuring squeeze, Gilbert ran upstairs to take a shower, a little relieved to have escaped the super-serious conversation that was rather unnerving.  
  
Gilbert's mother sighed in surrender. How could she make him see or feel or understand things he'd never experienced? She looked up into the sky that was a swirl of brilliant orange and blue as twilight struggled over the final moments of day.  
  
"John darling! I miss you so much. I wish you could be here. You could guide Gilbert in so many ways that I can't. Sweetheart, lead him in the best way, the happiest way. Do all you can for him from where you are and I'll do my best here, okay?"  
  
Margie Blythe wiped a tear away. 


	2. 2

-2-  
  
Gilbert was at the train station, looking over heads for their new tenant. The train had come and gone a quarter of an hour ago but still, there was no one who quite fitted the middle-aged spinster image. As the crowd thinned, Gilbert looked at his watch, it was thirty minutes past now. He walked along the platform, thinking perhaps this tenant wasn't coming after all. He walked into the waiting lounge. There was a single passenger seated in the corner, looking out the window. He had noticed her earlier, a young girl looking fresh out of college with flaming red hair and a lithe form that distinctly reminded him of a willow. She was looking dreamily out towards the fields, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she was now the only person left in the station.  
  
Gilbert took a second look at her, then shaking his head, went out to make a last check of the platform. Confirming that no one was in sight, he shrugged his shoulders in resignation and went to hitch his wagon. But out of a curiosity inexplicable to himself, Gilbert walked past the lounge again. This time, the redhead was furiously scribbling down something, muttering to herself. A thought suddenly struck Gilbert and he walked towards her.  
  
"Excuse me, Miss. You're not Miss Anne Shirley by any chance are you?"  
  
The passenger looked up, then jumped up eagerly, her pen and papers spilling all over the floor.  
  
"Yes, indeed I am! Anne Shirley, Anne spelled with an 'e' please! Free- lance writer. How do you do?"  
  
With that, the redhead flung her hand out to be shaken.  
  
Gilbert shook hands with her, feeling rather dazed.  
  
She began to gather her papers, and Gilbert bent down to help her.  
  
"I thought perhaps no one was coming for me. I was determined to sleep in the hollow of that beautiful cherry tree, perfect weather for an outdoor tryst, don't you agree? But I'm glad you've come after all, for I'm frightfully hungry! Awful trip it was! Ugh! But oh, you haven't told me your name! You are Mr …?"  
  
Gilbert's humor was returning to him and he couldn't wipe the grin off his face.  
  
He stood in attention and gave a small bow.  
  
"Gilbert Blythe of Blythe Homestead. At your service, Miss."  
  
She grimaced.  
  
"Blythe is no doubt a lovely name, but I hope your cottage is prettier than how it sounds, Blythe Homestead, indeed! No imagination, just no imagination at all!"  
  
Gilbert looked appraisingly at her. She had the most bewitching head of red hair he had ever seen, to his dying day, he would never forget the color of that hair! And her eyes, what marvelous eyes she had. Green with a touch of gray, that gave just the right look of mischief mingled with down-to-earth seriousness. She had quite an elegant nose and her lips were expressive and full. She was dressed smartly in travel clothes, no unnecessary frills but not shabby.  
  
Anne Shirley did a full turn, her eyes playfully teasing Gilbert.  
  
"Do I look quite alright? You're sure now? No horns and a tail despite the red hair, I promise!"  
  
Gilbert laughed.  
  
"Pardon me! It's just, well, I was expecting a 36-year-old spinster, not … not … well, certainly not a redheaded nymph who can chatter the hind leg off a mule!"  
  
It was Anne's turn to laugh now. And in that moment when their laughter entwined in the ephemeral space of endless time, they were fast friends.  
  
They chattered all the way home and Gilbert was surprised at how much fun he was having with this redheaded minx. She did most of the chattering while he made the occasional quip that egged her on and he found her to be quite intelligent and capable of an off-the-mark witty comment or two that had him howling.  
  
When they reached home, it was rather dark and Gilbert's mother was waiting anxiously on the patio. She was quite surprised and momentarily at a loss for words at sight of, not a docile old maid, but quite a young woman with all the grace and vivaciousness of youth!  
  
During dinner, the young tenant ate heartily and with relish in a way that would have made any chef proud, except the said chef was too busy trying to swallow this unearthly redhead in one sighting.  
  
"I'm so terribly sorry for misleading you like this. I suppose I must have been thinking of that silly article, 'the 36 ways to coerce a man according to Jamesina Williams' … 36 indeed! Is that all?! The silly things they'll put in magazines these days!"  
  
Gilbert coughed to hide the unholy laughter that was about to burst from him while Anne continued animatedly.  
  
"And I was fuming over the rubbish that is effectively numbing our intelligence by such nonsense at the time I was applying for your cottage and well, I suppose I wrote 36 instead of my age which is 22. I hope it won't make that much of a difference, will it?"  
  
And for the first time that evening, Anne looked rather worried as she looked from Gilbert to Mrs. Blythe.  
  
Gilbert winked at her and then looked at his mother. Anne followed his gaze and met Mrs. Blythe's look.  
  
"I'm just wondering how your parents are permitting you to stay so far away from home for the whole summer, dear. You wrote you were from Winnipeg?"  
  
Anne nodded in understanding.  
  
"Oh, you see, I'm an orphan. My parents both died of scarlet fever when I was three. I've been in and out of orphanages until I got a scholarship to go to Queens. I've been on scholarship all the way through Redmond and on my graduation, received a sum of money that was apparently put on a trust fund from my parents before their deaths which I was to receive upon coming of age. It was quite a sum and I am quite independent now. I was offered a job to work with a magazine in Montreal in the fall and having always heard that Prince Edward Island was the most beautiful place in Canada, I'd dreamt of coming here someday. That's why I decided to spend the summer here before going to Montreal."  
  
Mrs. Blythe looked wonderingly upon her new tenant. There were no traces of self-pity or inferiority that otherwise usually plagued those who grew up in such unfortunate surroundings. Gilbert meanwhile, looked upon her with renewed interest mingled with admiration. It was no small feat to have graduated from Redmond on a scholarship, he himself having received a full scholarship during his years in Redmond, knew all too well.  
  
"Well, dear, it seems you are a fellow student, my son also graduated from Redmond, though he continued his studies in McGill. He will be opening his practice here as a medical doctor in the fall. I welcome you dear and hope you have a pleasant stay. It's too late to settle in the cottage tonight so I'll show you to your room for the evening. If there's anything you need, let me know … Anne dear."  
  
Anne smiled and warmly shook Mrs. Blythe's hand.  
  
"Thank you so much, Mrs. Blythe."  
  
She followed her host upstairs, but not before giving a tiny wave to Gilbert in good night. Gilbert watched her go, interest mixed with curiosity in his thoughtful gaze. 


End file.
